Does BT’s move signal an end for net neutrality?

Do we have an automatic right to anything? Does BT have an automatic right to providing us with a line of communication? It certainly appears so as we all have to pay BT to get on the internet in the first place! Bring on the competition. It can only get better. I’ll certainly be the first person to get rid of a previously national company who now are still way behind the times but charging 21st century prices. Now they brag of their national upgrading work but don’t tell us that the government (we, the taxpayers) is paying for it!

The basic problem is that video consumes large amounts of bandwidth relative to most other internet usage.
Someone has to pay for the infrastructure to cope with this demand for “realtime” bandwidth if severe congestion is to be avoided.
Should all users pay higher chargers to their ISPs or only those users who want/need the bandwidth ?
Its a bit like do you build toll roads to ease motorway congestion or add extra lanes funded by everyone through taxes.

ps If you has access to cable you dont have to pay or use BT’s local infrastructure.

Surely the problem here is that the consumer, who ultimately pays, is being denied an effective choice?

Firstly decisions about quality of service are being made remotely from the consumer with no practical way to understand which organisation is having what effect at any particular time.

Secondly there is no effective way consumers can influence competition by their choices as long as they are locked into one contract. It is like committing that every time you drive between London and Manchester to only use the Birmingham relief road irrespective of its benefit to a particular journey.

“This is the first move towards a two-tiered internet that would discriminate against websites that want to offer high-bandwidth content (like video streaming) but can’t afford to pay ISPs for it.”

So who do they think is going to pay for it???

If a company wants to ensure a good end-customer experience for their high-bandwidth service, then they should have the right to buy this service. If I’m paying for premium content such as a streamed film, then I expect it to work without stalling or stuttering due to my neighbours checking their Facebook or watching clips of cats on YouTube.

This is known as “the real world”, where we have the choice to pay more for a premium service if we wish. The way people are using the web is changing – bandwidth requirements are rocketing, as are the associated delivery costs. Delivering a streamed high def film costs significantly more than checking email – this needs to be paid for, and as end users we are going to have to get used to this.

This approach seems to be gaining ground. PCPRO have a recent article – the-end-of-the-net-as-we-know-it – with views from talktalk.

I think that ISPs doing deals with content providers is a very bad idea. It removes options from ME as to what I can and can’t do. I agree that the infrastructure needs to be paid for, but the consumer ends up being stitched up without a voice – ISPs are going to make deals based on factors that are almost certainly not for MY benefit, but for theirs, and organisations who cannot do deals (perhaps the bbc whose charter might prevent it, and certainly smaller organisations / start ups etc) will get locked out in the wilderness. It’s another way for the media / content moguls to strangle new competition at birth.

Surely the right way here is for the consumer who wants to stream large amounts of video to pay both for the bandwidth and the quality of service to ensure it gets delivered? Most ISPs already cap bandwidth, charging more for higher capacity, and some of the more intelligent ones tie this to time of day as well. If I have paid extra (as I do) for extra capacity, I certainly don’t want my ISP choosing where I visit to use this capacity.

It’s not as if we don’t end up paying anyway if these megadeals start happening.

Certainly if my ISP goes ahead with anything like this, I’ll be switching